Our Constant Star: Advent Day 4

Read & Journal 

Read John 1:6-13. Consider these journal prompts: 

• Underline or note all the references to light in these verses. What do these references teach you about Jesus and why he came? 

• As you read these verses, do you notice any similarities to the ideas outlined in the first verse of “O Savior of Our Fallen Race”? Explain. 

• What does this passage teach you about John the Baptist and his role? 

• Reread verse 12. How would you explain this verse in your own words? 

Ponder

O Jesus, very Light of light,

Our constant star in sin's deep night.

Before electricity was common, torches, candles and eventually oil lamps all helped people see in the darkness. But those sources of light were often costly, sometimes dangerous and were by no means a permanent solution. While the light of one candle could pierce the darkness, those candles eventually burned out.

The light was only as good as its source. 

People also sometimes used mirrors or shiny surfaces to reflect the light created by a candle or a lamp. While the mirrors didn’t produce light on their own, they magnified the source, making its effect greater or more noticeable and helping more people. 

Some of those ideas are at work in today’s passage from John 1. In these verses, John introduced John the Baptist. This prophet was not the Messiah, John said, but he testified or pointed toward the true light of the world. Like a mirror in the days before electricity, John the Baptist reflected Jesus, testifying about what he was coming into the world to do, so that Jesus’ ministry and message could be magnified. John was a voice crying out in the wilderness, a point of light in the deep darkness of sin, but he wasn’t the true light. While he could point people toward the Messiah, John was not the source of light, life and eternal hope they were looking for. 

When the world lay mired in sin and darkness, the God who spoke the world into being was already at work to redeem his people. The true light that gives light to everyone was coming into the world (v. 9), and to all who receive him and believe in his name, he gives “the right to be children of God” (v. 12). John was the magnifier, the reflection, the forerunner of the Messiah, but only Jesus is the Source of Light, life and eternal hope. 

Jesus didn’t come into the world to make it a slightly better place; he came to redeem it from sin, darkness and despair. And if you are a Christ follower, then we, like John the Baptist, are not the sources of light, life and eternal hope in this dark world. 

But we are Jesus’ reflection in a dark world. We are the ones charged with magnifying his gospel of eternal hope to a world that has no hope. Shine brightly today!